U.S. men's water polo thrashed, won't medal

U.S. team members Peter Hudnut (center) and John Mann (right) sit on the bench in the closing minutes of their loss to Croatia in their Men's Quarterfinal water polo match. (Reuters Photo)

LONDON -- The members of the U.S. men's water polo team spent seven months together shunning money from the professional circuit to train together for a medal run. They likely will spend much, much longer attempting to figure out how it all went so profoundly wrong.

A disastrous 8-2 defeat by Croatia in the quaterfinals at the Water Polo Arena on Wednesday eliminated the 2008 silver medalists from contention for more hardware and left them wondering where the national program is headed next.

"It wasn't our day," center Ryan Bailey said. "We're very disappointed, of course. We came in to this Olympics thinking that we would win a medal. We really haven't performed."

Croatia scored the first five goals while the U.S. was failing score at all, including missing every chance while Croatia amassed nine first-half exclusions. The U.S. was just 1-of-8 on shots with an extra man during the game.

Scores from Bailey and Peter Varellas rallied the U.S. a bit in the third quarter, but Croatia answered with two goals before the period ended and cruised from there. Thus the team that broke a 20-year medal drought in the Beijing Olympics is left to wonder where it all goes from here.

"We physically put ourselves in a beter situation than anybody else in the world," captain Tony Azevedo said. "But obviously that's not he biggest thing in the sport.

"Maybe by staying away from so many games we missed out on that 40 to 50 games where we could have maybe played a little more. But, whatever. What are you going to do? You play a game like this, you do your movements, you swim them, you get your opportunities and the ball doesn't go in."